A journey through France's last Atlantic colony

How can it be that 15 miles off the wild, iceberg-dotted coast of Newfoundland there are two tiny islands that are forever France? This Wednesday, and for much of the rest of the year, the remote, barren and thoroughly bizarre archipelago of St Pierre and Miquelon will be awash with wine, music, picnic tables and tricolors as it celebrates 200 years of being a proud “morceau de France” in the vastness of North America.

While other European countries also have their crumbs left from the days of empire, the French maintain an enviably exotic spread of overseas departments and collectivities across the world. St Barths, French Guiana, French Polynesia, Réunion, Mayotte in the Comores...

A cross on a hilltop overlooks the village of MiquelonCredit:
Alamy

What makes these two enigmatic specks next to Canada stand out is that they represent the last gasp of a colonial territory that in the early 18th century stretched from Labrador to Louisiana. They are also not in the tropics – all the other French outposts that are inhabited lie somewhere warm and sunny, and are often places you might well want to go for a holiday. By contrast the average winter temperature here drops to minus 30C – as one resident confides, “the low season here is very long and very low”. Perhaps that explains why, while President Hollande paid a visit in December 2014 (and before that de Gaulle, Mitterrand and Chirac), Sarkozy never made it...

Getting to the gateway island of St Pierre, which lies west of the Burin Peninsula and is home to most of the 6,000 residents, requires determination – or bloody-mindedness if, like me, you get pleasure from reaching forgotten corners of the world. I do it by flying via St John’s, the capital of Newfoundland and Labrador, which is only a five-and-a-half-hour flight from London. From here it’s a 45-minute hop west with the islands’ airline, Air St Pierre, or a four-hour drive to Fortune, where you can catch a passenger ferry.

Whichever way you come, the wonder of these defiant little islands is just how resolutely French it all is. Gendarmes, euros, baguettes, Bastille Day, le Beaujolais nouveau est arrivé – it’s all here. Stroll down the rue du Général Leclerc and you’ll find well-dressed madames tucking into roulés à la cassonage in the Les Délices de Joséphine salon de thé. One might expect some concessions to the fact that we are 2,600 miles (4,000km) from Paris, but you have to look hard. There are big US cars among the Peugeots, and the streets are cleaner than the French capital, but the most obvious difference is how most wooden houses are painted in bright, often jarring colours. Magenta and mauve, orange and shamrock green... This is a Newfoundland tradition, presumably to counter the miseries of rain, fog and winter. On neighbouring Miquelon, even the Mairie is decked out in lime green and yellow, as if it secretly yearned to be in the Caribbean.

All this is reassuring news for the many North Americans, mostly day-trippers, who visit every summer, happy to taste la belle France without having to cross the Atlantic. St Pierre also welcomes about 10 cruise ships a year, as well as a stream of school trips and students coming to learn French.

How did this curiosity come about? Because of cod – the islands are at the heart of the once-abundant Grand Banks and were part of a protracted ding-dong between the British and the French that saw them change hands numerous times until the 1814 Treaty of Paris. Formal resettlement followed two years later, hence this year’s bicentenary, which will feature cultural performances and historic re-enactments.

The islands’ story is told in two St Pierre museums that bring home just how hard life must have been here. Among the exhibits in the L’Arche Museé is a guillotine, imported from Martinique, that was put to use only once, in 1889, after two fishermen murdered a third in circumstances where inebriation was declared “no excuse”.

The Tricolore flies in MiquelonCredit:
Alamy

Fortunes improved in the Prohibition era when the islands became a centre for smuggling whiskey, with Al Capone paying a visit and about 300,000 cases passing through every month. To keep the noise down, the bottles of Old Mull and Lauder’s Royal Northern Cream would be transferred to jute sacks, leaving a mountain of wooden cases that were then used as roof shingles and partition walls stamped with “Cutty Sark” and “This Side Up”.

While St Pierre clearly enjoys its role as a walk-in fragment of France, I find the much larger island of Miquelon-Langlade more alluring. The same size as Jersey, it is, in fact, two islands joined by an isthmus that is responsible for a fair few of the 600-plus shipwrecks that litter the archipelago. After HMS Niobe ran aground in 1874, Queen Victoria gave money for the construction of a lighthouse. Today Miquelon is a summer getaway with a seven-mile beach, walking trails and a farm producing confits, magrets and foie gras. When I lunch on some superb local lobster at L’Auberge de L’Ile, its jovial patronne apologises for not speaking English, then proudly relates how she is descended from a family member who was deported six times over a 25-year period before the sovereignty of the islands was finally settled two centuries ago.

Huge Iceberg Flips Over in Newfoundland

02:30

Will St Pierre et Miquelon remain a “terre de France en Amérique du Nord” for another 200 years? Quite likely, I suspect, and that’s good news for travellers. Frankly, there is an awful lot of Canada, and were it not for the quirks of history, what would otherwise be just another nondescript chunk of desolate, fogbound wilderness is today a bastion of civilised living and Gallic persistence. Vive la différence.

Getting there

Air Saint-Pierre(00508 41 00 00; airsaintpierre.com) flies from St John’s to St Pierre, from £176 return. Flights are also available from Halifax, Sydney and Montreal. Cabestan (001 709 832 3455; saintpierreferry.ca) operates ferry services from Fortune. The same companies for travel between St Pierre and Miquelon.

Information

Réunion

Almost 6,000 miles south-east of Paris, this mountainous Indian Ocean island offers exhilarating scenic drives around its volcanic craters and excellent walking along well-marked circuits de randonnée. The weather is best from April to November and visitors often combine days here with time on the beaches of Mauritius, a 45-minute flight east.

St Barths

This tiny Caribbean island transplants the best of France (terrific food, chic looks, serious spas) to a balmy backdrop of dazzling white beaches, turquoise waters and a laid-back vibe. The ambience is unashamedly “en vacances” with sophisticated hotels, boutiques and superyachts in the bay. Le Guanahani is a smart hillside resort with brightly coloured cottages set in vivid tropical gardens.

Guadeloupe

Known to many as “Sainte-Marie” and the setting for the long-running BBC detective drama Death in Paradise, Guadeloupe has a powerful beauty thanks to its active volcano, La Grande Soufrière. Empty beaches, rainforest hikes, Creole culture and a well-organised French infrastructure explain its growing popularity with tour operators. Western & Oriental (020 3588 6130; westernoriental.com) introduced the island this year with a range of three and four-star hotels that will appeal to independent-minded travellers.

A seven-night, twin-centre package visiting Grande-Terre and Basse-Terre starts at £1,679 per person, including return flights via Paris, transfers, breakfast and a catamaran excursion to Terre de Haut for snorkelling. visitguadeloupe.co.uk

French Guiana

On the north-east coast of South America, French Guiana (also known as Guyane) remains a destination for lovers of wild jungle and bizarre leftovers from the colonial era. Star sights are the capital Cayenne, Devil’s Island – once a penal colony where prisoners from Dreyfus to Papillon were held – and Kourou, home of the European Space Agency’s Ariane project. August to November is the best time to go and most visitors drop in as part of a larger tour taking in its Dutch and British counterparts, Surinam and Guyana.

August to November is the best time to visit French GuianaCredit:
Alamy

Journey Latin America (020 3740 4702; journeylatinamerica.co.uk) has an 18-day Trailblazing the Guianas group trip departing October 16 taking in all three plus portions of Venezuela and Brazil, from £5,186 per person, including flights, accommodation, excursions and most meals. guyane-amazonie.fr

French Polynesia

The jewel in the French overseas crown, the 118 islands of French Polynesia live up to their reputation as a South Pacific paradise. One of the best ways to get a taste is to sail from Tahiti to the Marquesas, where the painter Gauguin spent his final years, aboard the combined cargo and passenger ship Aranui 5. Launched in December, the new 254-berth vessel also calls into the Tuamotu Archipelago and Bora Bora, with May to September good months to go.

A 15-night package with Turquoise Holidays (01494 678400; turquoiseholidays.co.uk) costs from £4,795 per person, including return flight via Los Angeles, transfers and all meals and most activities on board. tahiti-tourisme.com